Highest Stakes (9 page)

  "Because she was born to run, and you asked her to! A game little mare like that would run herself to death before quitting!" Charlotte cast a guilty look at Amoret's body, now coated in sweat and white lather.

  "When the boys here exercise, they take their mounts for a light hack. That's a sedate trot and easy canter, not all out and hellfor-leather. A horse that's out of condition must be brought along easily, not worked too fast or for too long. You need to retrain the horse how to carry herself and strengthen her with light exercise, short gallops, short sweats, and regular rough offs, lest you destroy her legs."

  "But that's not how
you
were riding!"

  "It's
my job
to run the cracks, the ones who are already properly conditioned and ready to run. Did they teach you nothing where you came from, lad? And what
is
your name, anyway?"

  "I'm
not a lad
," she retorted, pulling her cap from her head, "and my name is Charlotte. Pray excuse me; my horse requires cooling."

For days following the incident, Charlotte feared that Robert would betray her to her uncle, but after a se'nnight of agony, Robert had not spoken a word. His behavior was puzzling. With caution, Charlotte resumed her rides, but to her consternation, Robert began to appear every morning on the heath.

With her breath catching and her pulse racing, she had run. Run

from any promise of friendship or love. But before long, she looked forward to their meetings with a fluttering heart and unexplained anticipation. Their morning rides became an exhilarating game of chase that Charlotte relished with sheer abandonment. For these few hours each day, Charlotte could take flight from her otherwise tightly controlled universe to share together this freedom and world without boundaries.

  Over time, this unspoken, nameless attraction between them continued to blossom, refusing to dwindle or fade, though they had little opportunity to foster or nourish it. Slowly and patiently, Robert's sheer persistence in the chase had revealed his heart, and Charlotte came to realize the nameless thing between them was love.

C
aptain Philip Drake swaggered down the line of crimson-coated new recruits, scrutinizing the would-be troopers with cynicism. Callow young men, barely off their mother's teat, with visions of grandeur in the King's Horse, he scoffed.

  At barely three-and-twenty himself, the young captain was one of over sixteen thousand Englishmen who had joined the British Army as part of the Pragmatic alliance to defend the territories of the new Queen of Austria after a French and Prussian invasion of her territories.

  George II, wearing dual crowns as King of Britain and Electorate of Hanover, headed the alliance, but acting more to secure his own German electorate than to honor the treaty with Austria.

  The vast majority of British recruits desired nothing more than to fight Britain's age-old Gallic adversary. Although they had little concern for the threat to Hanover, French dominion across the face of Europe was another thing altogether.

  Philip Drake was among this number and had purchased a commission with a small inheritance received on his twenty-first birthday. He had joined the King's Horse Guard with a desire to find purpose in his otherwise meaningless existence of drinking, gaming, and whoring, pursuits shared with his peers, other younger sons of nobility.

  Already an able horseman, Drake was prepared for grueling hours in the saddle, but on the training field, he discovered he was a near prodigy in the art of swordplay. With his natural confidence and cool head, he had the true makings of a cavalry officer, although he had lacked the necessary funds to advance his career. Fate, however, intervened, and Philip Drake, the ne'er-do-well scapegrace of his family, became a captain of the King's Horse through a game of chance.

  His first campaign, spent mostly garrisoned in Flanders, had failed miserably to live up to his expectations. Instead of riding gloriously into battle as he had envisioned, his entire regiment spent six months with thumbs up their arses whilst their generals dithered and the French amassed across the continent.

  Disillusionment led to fond reminiscences of his "worthless" days of gaming, drinking, and whoring. His former life may have been meaningless, but damned if he hadn't enjoyed it more!

  Increasingly restless and bored to distraction, newly commissioned Captain Drake began to drill and sharpen his men, lest in these months of inactivity they grow complacent, lazy, and dead… should the French and Prussians finally engage this muddle of a Pragmatic Army. In short order, the men under Drake's command were acknowledged as the best troop of the King's Horse.

  With recognition of his success, the captain was recalled from Flanders to Horse Guard headquarters with orders to train the new Household Cavalry recruits for the coming spring campaign.

  Now Captain Philip Drake faced his most daunting task: that of molding this pitiful assemblage into a troop worthy of the King's Horse.

  As Drake strode the ranks of new recruits and their horses, his critical eye saw little raw material with which to work. A trooper was responsible for providing his own horse, and by the look of it, a full fourth of the nags wouldn't survive a march, let alone a battle!

  Was this the best His Majesty could expect? He grimaced that any of this group might ride under his command. This was, after all, the unit bearing the Royal insignia, the best of the best, and their role was vital to the success of an army in the field. They were scouts, the eyes and ears of the generals, their watchfulness and intelligencegathering crucial to strategic decisions. They were the protectors of essential supply wagons and escorts to dignitaries carrying urgent messages. They were expert horsemen and fearsome warriors trained for swift and unexpected attack at a moment's notice. They were a breed apart, but the captain saw little evidence of any of these traits before him.

  "Mount your horses!" he boomed, watching each man pull himself into the saddle. His eye was caught by one particular trooper who vaulted with easy grace onto the back of a short-coupled, heavyboned skewbald. The captain swaggered up to this young man, who saluted awkwardly, sitting tensely at attention.

  "Name," the captain barked.

  "Devington, sir. Robert Devington," the young man croaked.

  "And what may I ask, Trooper Devington, is this sorry-looking beast? The King's Horse does not charge into battle on half-bred nags."

  Trooper Devington's face flushed. "Permission to speak, Captain?"

  He nodded curtly. "Permission granted, Trooper."

  "Respectfully, Captain, although this horse was the product of an inadvertent coupling between a carriage-bred stallion and a racing mare, I believe him to be a superlative cavalry mount."

  "You do indeed, Trooper Devington!" the captain roared and required more than a moment to compose his mirth before he could continue. "A superlative beast, you say? Pray tell me; upon what criteria?"

  The crimson-faced trooper continued, "The qualities m'father taught me to look for in all horseflesh, Captain—soundness, sense, swiftness, stamina, and strength."

  "Indeed desirable qualities…" The captain stepped back and circled around, scrutinizing the stocky gelding from every possible angle before snorting. "You actually believe
this
animal a paragon of the species?"

  The captain's remark, traveling like wildfire through the ranks, was received with muffled chortles and coughs.

  "Indeed I do. I'm no novice of horseflesh, Captain. On the contrary, I am well acquainted with this animal and confident in his abilities. He has demonstrated exceptional heart and stamina."

  Now more irked than amused by the cockiness of this green whelp, the captain pressed. "And what of your skill, Devington? It would seem that only one of exceptional ability could mount such an exceptional steed."

  "I hold my own, sir," he replied with quiet confidence.

  "Hold your own with whom, Trooper? This is not the annual plowshare pull or the cart race of the county fair."

  Trooper Devington's cheeks burned under the mockery. "Again, with due respect, sir, I can ride with the best of 'em."

  "So you say, Devington, so you say… but are you willing to wager your career on it?"

  Taken aback by the blatant challenge, Trooper Devington was at a loss to respond.

  "Perhaps you didn't hear me, Devington," the captain repeated, his voice echoing through the ranks. "Are you willing to wager your career on that horse?"

  "I'm not a gambling man, Captain."

  "Not a gambler, you say, but indeed a braggart."

  The captain addressed the full line of troopers in a booming voice. "There is no room in the Horse Guard for any whose words surpass their deeds." Addressing the trooper again, he commanded, "You may now prove your words, or dismount and return that wretched beast to your plowshare."

  His future drifting completely out of reach, Devington blurted, "I accept any challenge of riding skill that you make, Captain."

  "Do you now, Devington?" He paused. "I suppose you to be an expert swordsman, as well?"

  "That would be quite an erroneous assumption, sir. I claim no experience or skill with either sword or pistol."

  The trooper to Robert's right sniggered. The captain took mental note of him.

  "No martial skill, you say? Yet you chose a military career?"

  "These are skills I seek to acquire under your expert tutelage, Captain," he responded with sufficient humility to appease the officer, who now directed his attention to the sniggering trooper on Devington's right.

  "Name, Trooper," he commanded.

  "Prescott. George Prescott of the Derbyshire Prescotts," he replied smugly.

  "Sir!" Drake barked. "I am your commanding officer, Prescott, and am to be addressed at all times as 'sir,' or better yet, as 'Captain.'"

  Placing his arms behind his back, the captain paced down the ranks, speaking in an ominous voice. "You appeared prodigiously amused at Trooper Devington's inexperience with weaponry a moment ago, Prescott."

  "He is ill-prepared for the Horse Guard, Captain."

  "Indeed, it would appear so," the captain agreed. "And are you better prepared, Prescott?"

  "I have studied, Captain, under the finest instructors of both horse and sword. My fencing master was a student of Sir William Hope."

  "A student of Sir William Hope, you say? Then you are a virtual one-man army, to be certain. Perhaps we should send you to wage war single-handedly with the French, Prescott? The
Maison du Roi
will assuredly quake in their boots."

This was again met with muffled guffaws from the ranks.

  "I, for one, have no fear of embarrassing myself," Prescott retorted, eyeing Devington with open disdain.

  Raising his hands and looking about in mock wonderment, the captain stated to the assemblage, "I feel yet another challenge in the air."

  He resumed his pacing but this time slowly, pensively, thumb and forefinger to his chin. The past months on campaign had been tedious, filled with nothing but vacillations of the various generals, endless marching, and repositioning of forces, followed by more dithering while the French moved decisively and conquered. He was damnably tired of it and frustrated by inaction. He relished this opportunity to hone his skills, if only on these pitiful recruits.